Mexico federal police chief resigns in narcotics probe

ONE of Mexico's top police officers has quit after an aide was accused of working for a leading drug cartel, the security ministry said on Saturday.

Gerardo Garay, acting federal police commissioner, has stepped down and said he will cooperate with an organised crime investigation, a ministry spokesman said.

One of Garay's top lieutenants is being investigated by police on suspicions he was offering protection to the Sinaloa cartel, one of Mexico's main drug gangs.

"I am resigning because in the bloody fight against organised crime, it is our duty to strengthen institutions, which means it is essential to eliminate any shadows of doubt regarding me," Garay said late on Friday.

About 4,000 people have been killed in Mexico this year as gangs vie for control of the drug trade and security forces take on the cartels.

Garay's office was allegedly letting the Sinaloa gang move drugs through Mexico City's international airport, Mexican media reported, although the federal Attorney General's office said Garay was not formally under investigation himself. Garay denied he committed any crimes.

Mexican authorities have long been dogged by allegations top officials are on the payroll of the cartels that supply Americans with hundreds of tonnes of cocaine every year. Police recently arrested two top anti-drug officials accused of taking bribes of up to US$450,000 ($652,544) a month to leak intelligence to a drug trafficking cartel. US Customs and Border Protection also arrested a senior Mexican immigration official on the Arizona border last Sunday.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon has made cleansing the country's police forces a priority in his fight against drug gangs smuggling narcotics to the United States.

But low wages, shoddy equipment and rising insecurity in the face of the drug war have made that task increasingly difficult. Reuters